As a lone craftsperson Jeff Wooff on average makes four sets of pipes a year and in general lone craftspeople seem to emulate the same rate or maybe one more set per year.
Alain Froment as a lone craftsman made nine sets a year, this is twice the productivity of his contemporaries .I think if anybody was interested in making a career in pipemaking they should be asking, how the hell did he manage that . Considering what goes into a set of pipes that an outstanding amount of work.
I suppose it would be reasonable to think that maybe he cut corners or produced shoddy work to achieve this amount of work, but the fact is that he actually added corners. Not only did he work in one of the hardest metals to work on ,but his pipes were always full spec in regards to mounts and finish and on top of this the pipes he produced were some of the finest sounding pipes ever made.
The great tragedy to the pipeing community is not only the passing of a great pipemaker but also the loss of knowledge that unlike the understandable loss of knowledge of the “old masters” who died nearly two hundred years ago,with the near extinction of the pipes between then and now,the knowledge of pipemaking that Alain Froment had was right there . I don’t know if Mr Froment was secretive about his methods but I think he had taken on an apprentice shortly before he died, so heres hopeing that he passed on some of his secrets to him and he is invited to the NPU school to talk about the methods used by a pipemaking genius .
Alain Froment as a lone craftsman made nine sets a year, this is twice the productivity of his contemporaries .I think if anybody was interested in making a career in pipemaking they should be asking, how the hell did he manage that .
Alain worked really a lot. He did hours. From early in the morning to late at night. I think that he “overproduced” several sets per year thanks to his ability to work 12 hours per day. Not everyone has the ability to work 12 hours per day in a workshop.
Then he was really well organized. He used to be an engineer for Renault so he really knew what productivity and organisation meant. Finally, once he had a design he stucked to it without any alteration. Many custumers can testimony that he didn’t like that custumers asked for fancy option.
Here are I think his keys to produce so many sets.
Jeff Wooff also made on average 8 sets per year for some time. But he decided to slow down to have a better control on his instruments and a “better life”.
I don’t know if Mr Froment was secretive about his methods
Oh yes he was as every Breton people!!!
But when he felt that the person who he was talking to would do good use of his advice he could pass on few tricks.
He wasn’t an easy person to talk with about pipemaking. He had very very strong ideas.
As he learned stuff by hiself, he was conviced that any pipemaker had to learn general engineering to be able to work metal and so to be able to make tools. I think that it is possible to be a pipemaker without being a tool maker but being able to make your own tools is really the key for a success story. It really opens your mind and makes you able to make anything.
As you said Rory, great loss, but once somebody told me : “if one can, you can, despite how difficult what you want to do is”
That’s when I decided to try to make pipes.
Alain worked really a lot. He did hours. From early in the morning to late at night. I think that he “overproduced” several sets per year thanks to his ability to work 12 hours per day. Not everyone has the ability to work 12 hours per day in a workshop.
And with hindsight was this such a good idea looking at what happened to him. What is the point in working these long hours if you end up with serious health problems or dig yourself into an early grave.